Deloitte said it will offer managed services and consulting services in order to improve in-house departments, alongside expanding its current legal services such as employment law, tax and immigration.

“There is room [in the market] for a lot of players and our competitors in the Big Four are already operating in this space,” said Matt Ellis, managing partner for tax and legal at Deloitte.

While the shift by the big accountancy firms into legal services does not pose a big threat to the largest law firms, smaller practices could be affected.

Firms are also more likely to be able to take advantage of ABS changes in other jurisdictions, enabling them to exploit currently closed markets.

Deloitte said it planned to invest in and integrate technology and AI to its legal offering and use "technology and advisory skills to transform legal services and help address many of the challenges lawyers, whether in practice or in-house, are facing in today’s increasingly complex legal environment,” according to Ellis.

“By automating repetitive processes and completing routine tasks in a fraction of the time, lawyers will be able to spend more time on specialist areas,” he added.